


All Exiles Are Distinguished

by fictorium



Category: West Wing
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-23
Updated: 2011-01-23
Packaged: 2017-10-15 00:31:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,667
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/155199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fictorium/pseuds/fictorium





	All Exiles Are Distinguished

She shows up late at night, maybe once a week at most. Toby is usually not so much with the sleeping, whether because there's work to do or simply because his mind is still racing like a souped-up car at Daytona and won't let him rest. There's just one lamp on in the living room, and she doesn't turn on more like she would when they lived together.

It's June, and the building retains the heat of the day's sunlight. Toby is sitting at the card table that's become his dining table and home office, his shirt sleeves rolled up and collar unbuttoned in a rare concession to the summer that's invading Washington like a persistent virus. There's a sheen of sweat across his forehead, over the crown of his head where the hair has receded, and it's a second's work with a handkerchief to wipe the moisture away when he hears the quiet snick of the front door yielding to her copied key.

She walks in, dropping her blazer on the back of an armchair occupied only by a precarious stack of briefing memos. Andy is a beautiful woman, but in this soft lamplight she's nothing short of stunning. Toby reminds himself, belatedly, to keep breathing, and manages to obey before he makes a fool of himself (when it comes to Andrea, he can't seem to drop that particular habit).

The first few times she showed up with a pretext, some flimsy excuse about the twins or a staged argument about some piece of legislation she'd been sniping at as it made its way through the House. Toby is no expert in reading people, not in the way he can read and manipulate words, and for all the knowledge he's accrued since meeting Andy, she remains a resolutely blank page when she chooses to.

Tonight, she makes no such small talk, doesn't try to pick a fight. The twins will have been asleep for some time, Andy's mother hovering in the house that Toby bought like a specter at the feast. He wonders, in idle moments, how the two of them will raise Huck and Molly if and when ready volunteers run out. Tonight, Andy places her hands on her hips and tilts her head in a silent question, and Toby stops thinking about the future.

There's only one answer, since Gaza. There's only one way Toby can reassure himself that she's still alive, that the nightmares are simply the product of too much CNN and that the worst case scenarios didn't come true; not for his family, anyway. He stands, on legs that are steadier than he would have believed, and reaches for her hand.

She’s cold to the touch, despite the lingering heat of a summer evening. It shocks Toby, even though he should be used to it by now, and his own hand jolts as though making contact with electricity. Andy has been many things over the years -- but never cold, never with him.

 _Andrea_ , he breathes, scared to shatter the silence between them even though it's his territory she's encroaching upon. It's another Christmas Day ceasefire in the war of attrition they've been calling (or not calling) this relationship of theirs -- a sequence of apologetic beginnings and fiery ends that became a cycle neither one of them is willing to break.

 _Ssh_ , she chastises, and there's pure mischief in her eyes.

Tonight they don't make it out of the living room, because Andy shoves carelessly at the books that litter the sofa, and when she pulls Toby down to the smooth leather surface, he's only too happy to follow.

He can't offer her comfort; it's just not a weapon in his arsenal. He can offer her familiarity, an anchor to the world where she won't wake up in a cold sweat smelling phantom cordite or hearing invisible explosions. He can offer her this excess of heat to warm the shock from her body, to bring her back mentally as well as physically.

They kiss, almost lazily, the contours of her mouth still intoxicating to him as he revels in the feel of her beneath him. Andy wastes no time, unbuttoning the rest of his shirt, and she's beginning to lose some of the coolness when her hands skim over his shoulders.

A faint pink trail develops along her neck where Toby's beard has scratched across the tender skin, but Andy is arching into the contact and urging him on, so he soothes as best as he can with his lips, with his tongue. Her simple wrap dress is too sober for the season, but it's pleasantly easy to undo, revealing a sight that Toby can never tire of. Faint lines across her stomach belie the history of their children, the strongest bond between them. She isn't twenty any more, and a little definition has been lost, but Toby can look at himself and know that he's still light years out of his league -- if he voiced any such compliment, she'd deny it.

She's warm all over now, an even if heightened temperature that matches Toby's own. He's hard, pressed against her bare thigh, and it takes no time at all to fumble with his belt and push his slacks and underwear down to somewhere near his knees. This isn't a finesse game tonight, not the way that Andy's rocking her hips up towards him, and he's missed this rougher side to them. It occurs to him that a couple divorced for over four years should be long past missing anything, but convention is for lesser mortals than Andrea Wyatt, and he's happy to be along for the ride.

 _Toby_ she whispers, as though someone might be listening in the next room. _I need_ \-- she begins, but the words fall away even as he comes to understand them. It's not as though speaking ever gets them very far; action wins out every time.

He trails determine kisses across the planes of her breasts, still addicted to the feel of them under his lips, teasing at her nipples through black lace until they pebble in response. The soft moans that emanate from the back of Andy's throat spur him on, and he adds a hint of teeth that makes her nails dig harder into his back. There will be marks when he showers later, tender points that will sting under the shower, and Toby's glad because those scratches and bruises will be all he has to remember this by until she shows up once more. No promises, no guarantees, and no more inadvertent lying about vows they don't quite know how to keep; it's harder, sometimes, but it's better this way.

Unwilling to deny himself any longer, Toby lets his right hand travel down to the matching black panties that pose the last barrier between them. When he makes the first foray with his knuckles he's pleased to discover that Andy has already soaked through the flimsy material. He's beginning to ease her panties off with one hand, but Andy has no patience for these niceties. She sits up a little, leaning into him more, and tugs at the waistband with both hands. The elastic gives way under her determined fingers, and Toby doesn't watch where the black lace lands when she pulls it off and throws.

Massaging her clit between his knuckles is driving Andy wild, he can tell, but she's already eager for more and he's in no mood to deny her. Instead, he strokes two fingers through her considerable, hot, wetness and pushes inside with little ceremony. There’s nothing soft about the cry that falls from her mouth, and Toby kisses the echo when he captures her lips once more.

He can’t resist any longer, and as she wraps her insanely long legs around him, Toby guides his cock into her. He doesn’t linger on the mind-blowing sensation of _home_ , of how right it feels, but leveraging himself on his forearms he begins to thrust. Andy meets his movements in a long-established rhythm, with just the slightest note of something more desperate.

 _You’re still here_ is what he doesn’t say when she comes, but then he’s rendered mute by the way her back arches off the couch, the elegant lines of her neck as she throws her head back. He buries his face in her hair, vibrant and unruly as ever, and comes with a quiet roar that feels torn from his chest.

He needed this. He didn’t know just how much.

The moment wears off too fast, and Andy is wriggling her way out from under him. She smooths her hair and fixes her dress, not looking at him as he lies alone, faintly ridiculous in his state of half-undress.

 _You can stay_ , he offers, but she’s already on her way to the bathroom. She’ll wipe away the traces of what happened here tonight, and Toby will swallow his hurt feelings for a while. This is how they cope with trauma, how they’ll recover from her near-death experience and when that’s worked out they’ll find some other reason.

He’s dressed again, if a little rumpled, when she returns. Toby has pulled the throw down onto the couch, his own little cover-up, and is seated back at his wobbly desk once more.

 _Thank you_ she says, and she kisses him full on the mouth with a lot of other words hidden in the simple action.

 _Any time,_ he responds, reaching for a briefing memo on agricultural policy that he has to turn into inspiring rhetoric. It gives him something else to look at as she walks away, a sight he’s gotten too used to seeing.

It’s only when the door closes with a muffled thump that he looks up, sees the abandoned key on the edge of the table, glinting in the lamplight like a warning.

He reaches for his unfinished glass of Scotch, hoping he can drown whatever feelings he can’t shrug off. Maybe she won’t be back after all.


End file.
